Agatha Christie First Editions: How to Identify and Value Them

Most Agatha Christie first editions are British books from two publishers: The Bodley Head, for her first five novels from 1921 to 1925, and Collins from 1926, with the Crime Club imprint on almost everything from 1930. A handful of titles appeared in America first. For the pre-war books the dust jacket is most of the value: the best jacketed copies sell for tens of thousands of pounds, and the same book without its jacket for a few thousand or less.

The Bodley Head years (1920 to 1925)

The Mysterious Affair at Styles, Christie's first novel and Poirot's first case, was serialised in The Times Weekly Edition in 1920. John Lane published it in New York in late 1920, and The Bodley Head's London edition followed in January 1921 at 7s 6d. The British first is bound in brown cloth stamped in black. Sources differ on the size of the first printing, so treat any figure you see quoted as an estimate.

Christie earned just £25 from Styles, from her share of the serial rights. Her contract also committed her next five books to The Bodley Head, which published the British firsts up to The Secret of Chimneys (1925), including The Secret Adversary and Poirot Investigates.

Jacketed copies of Styles essentially never appear, as ILAB notes, and even unjacketed copies are valuable. Bonhams sold a British first without its jacket, with a split joint, for £1,625 in 2016. Heritage sold an American first for $10,625 in 2019.

Collins and the Crime Club

Collins became Christie's British publisher with The Murder of Roger Ackroyd in June 1926, bound in blue cloth lettered in red. It is a plain Collins book: the Crime Club imprint did not exist until May 1930.

The Murder at the Vicarage, in October 1930, was Christie's first Crime Club book. From then on all but five of her books carried the imprint, with its hooded gunman logo on the jackets. The Crime Club issued about 2,000 first editions across all its authors between 1930 and 1994, with print runs averaging close to 5,000 copies, according to Rare Books Digest.

How to recognise a pre-war Crime Club first

• Date. Crime Club books are dated on the title page. Check the year against the first edition year.
• Cloth. Usually orange or red cloth lettered in black. The Murder at the Vicarage exists in black and in orange cloth; Collecting Christie treats black as the earlier state.
• Jacket price. A first-state jacket is priced 7/6 or more, usually on the spine or at the foot of the front flap. A 3/6 price, or a 3/6 sticker over 7/6, marks a later cheap issue. An unpriced jacket can mean a colonial edition.
• Wraparound bands. A few titles, among them Murder on the Orient Express, were issued with a Crime Club band around the jacket. Copies with the band are rare.

When America came first

Most Christie novels appeared in Britain first, but check these:

Title	First edition	British edition
The Mysterious Affair at Styles	John Lane, New York, 1920	The Bodley Head, 1921
Murder in Three Acts	Dodd, Mead, 1934	Three Act Tragedy, Collins, 1935
Parker Pyne Investigates	Dodd, Mead, June 1934	Collins, November 1934

Dodd, Mead asked Christie to change the motive in Murder in Three Acts, so the American and British texts differ. One collector's source puts Death in the Air (the American title of Death in the Clouds) ahead of the British book in 1935, while the standard bibliography gives both the same year.

Even when the British book came first, American firsts are collected. Murder on the Orient Express appeared in America as Murder in the Calais Coach, and about 250 copies were numbered in red and marked not for sale for a booksellers' dinner.

The headline titles

Year	Title	British first	Jacket
1926	The Murder of Roger Ackroyd	Collins	7/6, art by Ellen Edwards
1930	The Murder at the Vicarage	Collins Crime Club	7/6 on the spine
1934	Murder on the Orient Express	Collins Crime Club, 1 January	7/6
1936	The A.B.C. Murders	Collins Crime Club
1937	Death on the Nile	Collins Crime Club, 1 November	7/6
1939	And Then There Were None	Collins Crime Club, 6 November

Murder on the Orient Express had a very small first impression and was reprinted twice in January 1934, so check the title page and the back of it for impression details. A fourth impression exists in orange cloth for Britain and black cloth for export.

And Then There Were None was first published in Britain under an offensive title that is no longer used. Dodd, Mead gave it the current title for the American edition of January 1940, and the first British edition under that title was a Fontana paperback of 1985.

What they sell for

Sotheby's sold a run of jacketed British firsts in February 2021, and the prices show how far the jacket and the title move value:

• The A.B.C. Murders: £47,880
• Murder in the Mews: £30,240
• Lord Edgware Dies: £27,720
• Murder on the Orient Express: £13,860
• Death on the Nile: £5,670

Without the jacket the numbers fall sharply. Bonhams sold an Orient Express first in orange cloth with no jacket for £2,167.50 in 2022. For the 1920s and 1930s books, the gap between a Near Fine jacket and a Good one is vast, as Collecting Christie puts it, and few 1920s titles have come to auction in Very Good jackets at all.

Prices are from named sales; they are not valuations of your copy. Our guide to how much your book is worth explains how to compare like with like.

Jackets: what to watch for

Because the jacket carries the value, it is where problems hide.

• Married jackets. A jacket taken from another copy. Compare the fading of the cloth spine with the wear on the jacket: a sunned book in a bright jacket, or the reverse, is a warning.
• Later jackets. A 3/6 price or sticker means a cheap reissue jacket, not the first.
• Trimming and restoration. Check the jacket's edges and folds closely, and ask about any restoration.
• Facsimiles. Reproduction jackets for Christie are common. See our guide to facsimile dust jackets.

Check your copy

1. Read the title page: publisher, place and date. Match them to the first edition for that title.
2. Check whether the title appeared first in America (see the table above).
3. Look at the cloth colour and the spine imprint (Collins or The Crime Club).
4. Find the jacket price on the spine or front flap: 7/6 or more for a first-state pre-war jacket.
5. Compare fading on the book and the jacket to rule out a married jacket.
6. Look the title up on its MyVolumes page, try Is my book valuable?, and grade it with our condition guide.